Selection of Content Item Recommendations Based on User Search Results

1. A computer-implemented method for selecting promotional information for display, the method comprising: receiving, by a configured computing system of a content item selection service that communicates with computer systems of a separate online retailer over one or more computer networks, information about search results generated by the online retailer in response to a search request by a user, wherein the search results indicate multiple products available to be acquired from the online retailer and are included in a search results Web page from the online retailer to be displayed to the user on a client device of the user; automatically determining, by the configured computing system of the content item selection service, a product category to associate with the search request by analyzing information about multiple product categories of the indicated products in the search results; sending, by the configured computing system of the content item selection service, one or more electronic communications that have information about one or more additional products to include as part of the search results Web page displayed to the user, wherein the one or more additional products are distinct from the indicated products in the search results and are selected from the determined product category by the configured computing system; determining, by the configured computing system of the content item selection service and based at least in part on the determining of the product category to associate with the search request, to further associate the determined product category with one or more additional Web pages that are displayed to the user on the client device as a result of one or more interactions by the user with the search results included in the displayed search results Web page, including to send one or more additional electronic communications with information about one or more further products selected from the determined product category to include as part of the one or more additional Web pages displayed to the user; and updating, by the configured computing system of the content item selection service, and based at least in part on one or more further interactions by the user with the displayed one or more additional Web pages, an association for the search request from the determined product category to a different product category, for use with later searches by other users using the search request.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the search request includes one or more search terms, and wherein the method further comprises storing a mapping of the one or more search terms to the determined product category, and using the stored mapping with the later searches by the other users that use the search request including the one or more search terms.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the using of the stored mapping further includes: after the storing of the mapping, receiving information about other search results generated by the online retailer in response to a second search request by a second user that includes at least one of the one or more search terms, the other search results to be displayed to the second user as part of a second search results Web page that indicates one or more products available to be acquired from the online retailer; and automatically identifying one or more additional products to recommend to the second user as part of the second search results Web page based at least in part on the stored mapping, the additional products to recommend to the second user as part of the second search results Web page being distinct from the indicated products of the second search results Web page and being part of the determined product category.

4. The method of claim 2 wherein the updating of the association for the search request from the determined product category to the different product category includes receiving information about later online activities of the user related to at least one of the multiple products that is part of the different product category, and updating the stored mapping to further associate the one or more search terms with the different product category.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the receiving of the information about the later online activities of the user includes at least one of dynamically tracking actions taken by the user after the sending of the one or more electronic communications and of analyzing log information from the online retailer that includes information about the actions taken by the user.

6. The method of claim 2 wherein the automatic determining of the product category further includes analyzing information about actions previously taken by other users involving products that are part of the determined product category, the previously taken actions occurring after prior search results were provided to the other users for prior searches by the other users that each included at least one of the one or more search terms.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein the previously taken actions include actions related to purchasing one or more products that are part of the determined product category.

8. The method of claim 6 wherein the previously taken actions include selections made by the other users to obtain additional information about one or more products that are part of the determined product category.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the analyzing of the information about the multiple product categories of the indicated products in the search results includes analyzing product metadata obtained from the online retailer about at least one product of the indicated products, the product metadata including information regarding at least one product category associated with each of the at least one indicated products.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the sending of the information about the one or more additional products includes sending multiple content pieces of a plurality of content types, the plurality of content types including text, images, video clips and audio clips.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein the determining of the product category to associate with the search request includes determining one or more associated product categories for the search request, wherein the search request includes one or more search terms, and wherein the method further comprises obtaining information about multiple prior searches by the user that each includes at least one of the one or more search terms and that are associated with the determined one or more associated product categories, and storing, by the configured computing system, mapping information that associates the user with the determined one or more associated product categories based on the search request and on the multiple prior searches, to enable subsequent actions to be taken for the user corresponding to the determined one or more associated product categories.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein the method further comprises adding, by the configured computing system, the user to a group of multiple users that is associated with the determined one or more associated product categories, and electronically providing, by the configured computing system, information about the group of users to an external entity to enable the external entity to take one or more further actions involving the users of the group and corresponding to the determined one or more associated product categories.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein the method further comprises, before the adding of the user to the group of multiple users, automatically determining, by the configured computing system, at least some of the multiple users for the group by analyzing information about actions previously taken by the at least some users involving products that are part of the determined one or more associated product categories.

14. The method of claim 1 wherein the method further comprises, after display of the search results Web page to the user: identifying, by the configured computing system, the one or more additional Web pages displayed to the user after the search results Web page, wherein the one or more additional Web pages do not include any search results; and after the determining to further associate the determined product category with the one or more additional Web pages, providing, by the configured computing system and to one or more other users, content items corresponding to the determined product category for display along with the one or more additional Web pages.

15. The method of claim 1 wherein the method further comprises, after display of the search results Web page to the user: identifying, by the configured computing system, the one or more additional Web pages displayed to the user after the search results Web page, wherein the one or more additional Web pages are not associated with any product categories before the determining to further associate the determined product category with the one or more additional Web pages; and after the determining to further associate the determined product category with the one or more additional Web pages, providing, by the configured computing system and to one or more other users, content items corresponding to the determined product category for display along with the one or more additional Web pages.

16. The method of claim 1 wherein the automatic determining of the product category for the search request includes selecting a single associated product category for the search request based at least in part on determining a most frequent product category of the multiple products, wherein the method further comprises storing the association for the search request with the determined product category, and wherein the updating of the association includes updating the stored association.

17. The method of claim 1 wherein the automatic determining of the product category for the search request includes selecting a single associated product category for the search request based at least in part on at least some of the multiple product categories being sub-categories of the single associated product category, wherein the method further comprises storing the association for the search request with the determined product category, and wherein the updating of the association includes updating the stored association.

18. A computing system, comprising: one or more processors; and a system that, when executed by at least one of the one or more processors, causes the computing system to: receive search results that are generated in response to a search request by a user and that indicate multiple items from multiple product categories, wherein the search results are provided by one or more online retailers; automatically determine one or more additional items to recommend to the user that are distinct from the multiple items indicated in the search results, by automatically determining one product category of the multiple product categories to associate with the search request from analyzing information about the multiple items in the search results, storing an association of the search request with the determined one product category, and selecting the one or more additional items from a plurality of items in the determined one product category; automatically send one or more electronic communications that have information about the one or more additional items, to cause the additional items to be included as part of a single search results Web page displayed to the user that also includes the search results; and update, after the sending and based at least in part on one or more interactions by the user with at least one of the displayed single search results Web page or one or more additional Web pages that are subsequently displayed to the user, the stored association of the search request from the determined one product category to a different product category, for use with later searches based at least in part on the search request.

19. The computing system of claim 18 wherein the multiple items are each a product that is associated with one of the multiple product categories, and wherein the automatic determining of the one product category from the multiple product categories includes determining a most frequent product category of the multiple items.

20. The computing system of claim 18 wherein the multiple items are each a product that is associated with one of the multiple product categories, and wherein the automatic determining of the one product category from the multiple product categories includes determining the one product category based at least in part on one or more other product categories of the multiple product categories being sub-categories of the one product category.

21. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored contents that cause a computing system of a content item selection service to automatically perform a method, the method comprising: receiving, by the computing system, information about search results generated by an online retailer in response to a search request by a user, wherein the search results are to be displayed to the user as part of a single search results Web page and include multiple products from multiple product categories that are available to be acquired from the online retailer, and wherein the content item selection service is separate from the online retailer; automatically determining, by the computing system and before the search results are displayed to the user as part of the single search results Web page, a product category of the multiple product categories to associate with the search request, the determining including analyzing information about the multiple products in the search results and identifying a most frequent product category to which the multiple products belong; automatically identifying, by the computing system, one or more additional products from the determined product category to display to the user along with the search results as part of the single search results Web page, the additional products being distinct from the multiple products in the search results; sending, by the computing system, one or more electronic communications that have information about the identified one or more additional products to include as part of the single search results Web page displayed to the user; determining, by the computing system and based at least in part on the determining of the product category to associate with the search request, to further associate the determined product category with one or more additional Web pages that are displayed to the user as a result of one or more interactions by the user with the search results included in the displayed single search results Web page; and sending, by the computing system, one or more additional electronic communications with information about one or more further products selected from the determined product category to include as part of the one or more additional Web pages displayed to the user.

22. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the search request includes one or more search terms, and wherein the method further comprises storing, by the computing system, a mapping of the one or more search terms to the determined product category.

23. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 22 wherein the stored contents include software instructions that, when executed, further cause the computing system to: after the storing of the mapping, receive information about a second search request by a second user that includes at least one of the one or more search terms; and automatically identify, based at least in part on the stored mapping and on the at least one search term, one or more additional products to recommend to the second user in response to the second search request, the additional products to recommend being part of the determined product category.

24. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 22 wherein the method further comprises, after the sending of the one or more electronic communications, receiving information about later online activities of the user related to at least one of the multiple products that is part of an additional product category separate from the determined product category, and updating the stored mapping to further associate the one or more search terms with the additional product category.

25. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 24 wherein the receiving of the information about the later online activities of the user related to the at least one product includes at least one of dynamically tracking actions taken by the user after the sending of the one or more electronic communications or of analyzing log information from the online retailer that includes information about the actions taken by the user.

26. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the search request includes one or more search terms, and wherein the automatic determining of the product category further includes using information about actions previously taken by other users involving products that are part of the determined product category, the previously taken actions occurring after prior search results were provided to the other users for prior searches by the other users that each included at least one of the one or more search terms.

27. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 26 wherein the previously taken actions include actions related to purchasing one or more products that are part of the determined product category.

28. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 26 wherein the previously taken actions include selections made by the other users to obtain additional information about one or more products that are part of the determined product category.

29. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 26 wherein the automatic determining of the product category further includes not selecting other product categories based at least in part on the prior search results including one or more further products from the other product categories and on the previously taken actions of the other users not being based on the one or more further products.

30. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 26 wherein the automatic determining of the product category further includes not selecting other product categories based at least in part on the prior search results including one or more further products from the other product categories and on the previously taken actions of the other users being based on the one or more further products.

31. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 26 wherein the automatic identifying of the one or more additional products further includes not including one or more further products in the identified additional products based at least in part on the prior search results including the one or more further products and on the previously taken actions of the other users not being based on the one or more further products.

32. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 26 wherein the automatic identifying of the one or more additional products further includes not including one or more further products in the identified additional products based at least in part on the prior search results including the one or more further products and on the previously taken actions of the other users being based on the one or more further products.

33. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the analyzing of the information about the multiple products in the search results includes analyzing product metadata obtained from the online retailer about at least one of the multiple products.

34. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the sending of the one or more electronic communications includes sending one or more of text, images, video clips or audio clips.

35. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the search request includes one or more search terms, and wherein the method further comprises obtaining information about multiple prior searches by the user that each includes at least one of the one or more search terms and that are associated with the determined product category, and storing, by the computing system, mapping information indicating an association of the user with the determined product category based on the search request and on the multiple prior searches, to enable subsequent actions to be taken for the user corresponding to the association of the user with the determined product category.

36. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 35 wherein the method further comprises adding, by the computing system, the user to a group of multiple users that is associated with the determined product category, and electronically providing, by the computing system, information about the group of users to an external entity to enable the external entity to take one or more further actions involving the users of the group and corresponding to the determined product category.

37. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 36 wherein the method further comprises, before the adding of the user to the group of multiple users, automatically determining, by the computing system, at least some of the multiple users for the group by analyzing information about actions previously taken by the at least some users involving products that are part of the determined product category.

38. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the method further comprises, after display of the search results Web page to the user: identifying, by the computing system, the one or more additional Web pages displayed to the user after the search results Web page, the one or more additional Web pages not including any search results; and wherein the sending of the one or more additional electronic communications includes, after the further associating of the determined product category with the one or more additional Web pages and by the computing system, sending content items corresponding to the determined product category for display to one or more other users along with the one or more additional Web pages.

39. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21 wherein the method further comprises, after display of the search results Web page to the user: identifying, by the computing system, the one or more additional Web pages displayed to the user after the search results Web page, the one or more additional Web pages not being associated with any product categories; and wherein the sending of the one or more additional electronic communications includes, after the further associating of the determined product category with the one or more additional Web pages and by the computing system, sending content items corresponding to the determined product category for display to one or more other users along with the one or more additional Web pages.